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Monday, March 23, 2015

Lee Kuan Yew and guided democracy

The great and admired Lee Kuan Yew passed away today at 3.18am and Singapore enters a new period without his presence. His rule reminded me of a General Paper essay I had wrote in Form 6 about democracy where I wrote democracy is but a rule by the average intelligence population and a BENEVOLENT dictator will do better.

A leader in a true democracy needs to gets his mandate every few years from voters whose intelligence is as distributed similar to a normal curve, very few highly intelligent people at one end, few low IQ people at the opposite and the great majority average intelligence in the middle.


Normal distribution. Source: Wikipedia

Because a leader in a democracy needs to get his mandate from the voters which majority are of average intelligence, a democracy is but a rule by the average intelligence. A leader in a democracy may be forced to implement popular policies which may not be of long term benefits to the country.

A benevolent dictator who has the best interest of the people at heart to me is a better choice, but God help us if we get a dictator who ruled for his own interest. To me, the late Lee Kuan Yew is a good example of "guided democracy" where the people are wise enough to elect and reelect such a benevolent dictator.

Thursday, March 19, 2015

Is it OK to lie to non-Muslims? Taqiya

I have sat through the video, 3 things you probably don't know about Islam and its main points can be summarized as
1. There are contradictions in the Quran but Quran has provided a way to handle contradictions: if there are contradictions, the later verses will override the earlier verses
2. It is the obligation of every Muslim to strive till Sharia is imposed in the whole world (creeping Islam)
3. It is OK to lie to a non-Muslim as long as it advances the interest of Islam (Taqiya)

I have not read the Quran, perhaps later when I have done, but have found an article where they quote verses from the Quran at Lying (Taqiyya and Kitman). The verses are not quoted verbatim but explanations. However, since the verses are numbered it will be easy to refer to the Quran to look up the verses and this is what I intend to do when I get my hands on the free copy of translation of the Quran and I would encourage you to do the same.

But in the meantime, let me focus on 3 (Taqiya) and examine this recent incident where PAS has passed a bill to impose Hudud on Kelantan and Kelantan PAS was also reported to have said We have the numbers for Hudud in Parliament

Note that in 2011, PAS had pushed the Welfare State and the slogan PAS for all, supposedly to appease non-Muslims and now has turned around and pushed to impose Hudud despite strong objections from its allies in DAP.

Footnote: There don't seem to be any reference to lying to non-Muslims to advance the interest of Islam in Wikipedia: Taqiya, only mentions of lying in time of dangers, so this may mean we really have to read the Quran for ourself to establish the truth.

Video: 3 things you probably don't know about Islam